


Warmth

by scorchedtrees



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-26
Updated: 2014-07-26
Packaged: 2018-02-10 13:33:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2026959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scorchedtrees/pseuds/scorchedtrees
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arya's life is one of cold and darkness, but Gendry is her warmth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Warmth

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Arya/Gendry Week Day 5: Warmth. Warning that I have no idea what I'm doing and hopefully this makes sense.

Arya’s life is one of cold and darkness.

She was born in the long summer but she is a Stark, a child of winter, and that season, as the North knows, is always just around the corner. When she was still a little girl sitting on her father’s lap, he would tell her stories of what their ancestors braved for centuries before she came into the world, and she would listen wide-eyed and open-eared and repeat to herself their motto like a mantra.

Despite all the times she heard the phrase, she never expected winter to come so quickly, in the lazy sun-lit halls of the Red Keep, in the crowded bloodthirsty heat of King’s Landing, and as she is trundled off to the Wall with a large group of boys who think they’re ready to face the True North, she wishes she had prepared better.

The long days of traveling are dreary, the longer nights spent curled up shivering by herself in the corner lonely, and she whispers names to herself in the dark and lets them clear her gaze, sharpen her focus, but they do nothing to ward off the chill in her heart.

One night someone settles behind her and she stiffens, sitting up, ready to thrust her elbow into the gut of whomever tried to sneak up on her—only warm fingers catch her arm before she moves it and a familiar voice mutters, “Relax.”

“What are you doing?” she snaps, jerking around to glare. The fire has burnt low and tendrils of its flames flicker in Gendry’s blue eyes.

“I can hear your teeth chattering all the way from there; you’re keeping me awake,” he says, nodding at his spot close by the fire. He lies down and pulls her next to him, his arm heavy across her shoulders. “Go to sleep.”

She wants to shove him away, to tell him it’s none of his business and she doesn’t need his help and she was muttering to herself, not letting her teeth chatter, thank you very much, but he  _is_  awfully warm. When she snuggles closer to him, he opens one eye to give her a look she thinks is far too insolent, so she knees him in the side. Gently, though; he chuckles and soon she finds herself drifting off into a dreamless sleep.

It isn’t the last time she realizes how much she appreciates his warmth: the fires of the forges he works in seem to burn in his blood. His hands are always hot, his silent presence and quiet words and faintest touch comforting, and whether he is standing beside her with sword drawn or dragging her away from doling justice to the Hound, she starts to forget she is winter’s child, meant to live in the cold, and begins to rely on his warmth.

Even when she should still be angry with him, when she is deep in the House of Black and White, when she is supposed to need no one, be No One, sometimes she lets the image of his face flash in her mind, and she cannot help wondering what he is doing anyway—if he is alive, if he is well. If he thinks of her.

_I am No One,_  she reminds herself, every day, and it becomes her new motto: she is no longer Arya Stark of Winterfell who lets herself believe  _winter is coming_. Winter is an ever-present thing, even in the sprawling canals of Braavos.

_I am No One,_  she reminds herself, once a day, every day, up until the day she is back in Westeros and she runs into the Brotherhood Without Banners.

She remembers all their faces, calls them by name, and they laugh and jest and welcome her back to the Seven Kingdoms. She tries not to search for a certain face, but when she finally spots it at the edge of the crowd, she tenses.

He disappears and she tries to push him out of her mind, but when they set up camp that night, she finds him outside his tent, turning a helm over and over in his hands.

“You’re back,” he says quietly, voice hoarse, staring at the ground.

She does not answer, her arms crossed over her chest, and he raises his eyes to meet hers.

“You’re angry with me.”

“You left.”

The first words she has spoken to him in years and she sounds cold, uncaring. But that should be how it is—Gendry cared for Arya Stark, and Arya Stark is no more. She is No One.

“No,” he says, but he stands, and she takes a step back because after all this time, he still towers over her. “ _You_  left, if I recall.” He is even taller than before, his shoulders broader, his hands bigger, but his eyes and face and voice are uncertain and so very  _Gendry_. “I missed you,” he says quietly, more to himself than her, and she’s supposed to be angry with him, she wants to be angry with him, but instead she feels her careful mask start to slip.

He reaches one hand for hers, and she stills. His fingers cup hers, every bit as warm and gentle as she tried not to remember, and she lets his touch linger for a moment before drawing away.

Despite telling herself to distance herself, to leave behind all ties Arya Stark had to Westeros, she finds herself spending more and more time with him in the coming weeks as the men rally behind her to march on Winterfell, to retake it from the Bastard of Bolton. She does not want to see the great castle, does not want to see her siblings again, because she wants both so much it is a constant ache in her chest that she has no idea how to deal with.

“You’ll be alright, m’lady,” Gendry says, trying to get a rise out of her, to lighten her spirits. She is in his tent, the moon shining low in the sky outside; she’s been sleeping in his bed nearly every night since the nightmares began. She does not know if they are induced by her proximity to Arya Stark’s home or something else, but Gendry’s presence gives her comfort, and she does not care what others think they actually do in his tent; let them talk.

“I wonder if Winterfell will be alright,” is her only response.

The night before the battle she cannot sleep, and she listens to the sounds of men outside, preparing for the next morning. Gendry shifts and wraps one arm around her and she is reminded of the first time he did this, all those years ago on the road North, when he was just a bastard boy abandoned by his master and she was a little orphan boy named Arry.

“Sleep,” he says, his breath a tickle on her cheek, his body warm against hers, and suddenly wanting to feel more of that heat, she leans forward and presses her lips to his.

He freezes, his hands suddenly awkward against her skin, and she kisses him again, deciding she likes the sensation. As if against his own will, he kisses back, and when she drags her teeth across his lower lip, testing out the motion, he groans and pulls away.

“Arya, we can’t—”

“You’d rather I do this with someone else?”

“Seven hells,” he curses, and she can see the way his eyes flash in the moonlight seeping through the cracks of his tent. “You have to know I’ve always wanted—”

“Then shut up, stupid, and kiss me.”

“But others will—”

“Everyone already thinks something’s going on,” she says, frowning at him. “If you’re going to complain, I’m leaving now—”

He cuts her off mid-sentence by dragging her back to him.

She’s always known Gendry was warm, but she experiences an entirely different sort of heat that night—something that starts in the pit of her stomach and spreads to every other part of her body, an all-consuming heat that sparks in her toes and lights every nerve ending on fire, a heat she never wants to let die out. She wakes with her limbs entangled with his, every place where their bodies touch warm, and for one moment she closes her eyes and pretends she can sleep a little longer.

The battle is fierce, the courtyards noisy with the clang of steel and shouts of the dying, a heavy metallic scent permeating the air. The smell of smoke does not overpower the stench of rot and blood, and after Ramsey Snow’s head rolls away and she drops the Stark greatsword, she cannot help feeling an aching sense of loss.

She said the words before she removed the head; she cannot deny it no longer. She is Arya Stark, and with the name and title come responsibilities.

She wants to disappear, to melt in the shadows again, to do as she was taught and vanish without a trace. But she will stay in Winterfell, she will wait for her siblings, and she will find Gendry.

She does, by the forge.

_Of course it is the forge,_  she cannot help thinking even as she rushes over and pulls his helm back; his eyes are thankfully closed. His armor is sticky with blood but so is his blade, and she removes each plate frantically, her hands twice as unsteady as they were when they hefted the sword that took the Bastard of Bolton’s life.

She finds the entrance wound in his abdomen; a sword must have lodged its way through the cracks in his armor. Panic squeezes her insides into a twisted mess as she presses her hands over his heart, searching for that warmth, but it is gone.

She should have known; she should have known the moment she saw him again and felt his warmth. Because the moment she saw him, she was no longer No One but Arya again, a Stark, a child of winter, and Arya’s life is one of only cold and darkness.


End file.
